394 EXTERNAL ANATOMY OF INSECTS. 



all inquirers, much of the present confusion and misunderstand- 

 ing about priority might be avoided, and moreover a very 

 essential service rendered to beginners. My, The formation of 

 a library; and to assist in this we think that every author 

 should make the Society a present of his own works, or copies 

 of papers published in periodical works. 3dly, The reception 

 of scientific papers : we would venture to suggest that these 

 should be read by their authors, that during the reading 

 silence should be maintained, and that each paper should 

 become the subject of discussion, during which only one 

 member should be allowed to speak at a time, and that until 

 the chair had been vacated no general conversation should 

 take place. We merely throw out these hints ; if the council 

 do not consider them worth attending to we shall be perfectly 

 satisfied without making any attempt to enforce them ; but it 

 is easier to avoid the acquisition of bad habits than to escape 

 from them when acquired ; and the constant conversation during 

 the reading of papers at learned societies in general we really 

 must consider somewhat indecorous. 



Art. XLVI. — Osteology, or External Anatomy of Insects. 

 By Edward Newman, Esq., F.L.S. 



" I find it impossible to give, according to the present state of science in 

 England, any satisfactory description of insects without making some previous 

 observations on their anatomical nomenclature." MacLeay. 



" Ce que personne n'avait encore tente j'ai ose I'entreprendre." 



Savigny. 



Letter I. — On the Primary Parts of Insects. 



Sir, — It is with a full consciousness of ray inability to ren- 

 der it justice, that I undertake a subject from which all our 

 entomologists seem to have shrunk, viz. the substitution of 

 a natural nomenclature of the parts of insects for the artificial 

 one proposed by Linnaeus, which is still in universal use ; but 

 I have always considered that it is more commendable to do 

 our best, however short of perfection that best may be, than to 

 procrastinate the little service we may render to others, in the 

 vain and selfish hope that we may hereafter render our labours 

 so complete as to be an object of general praise. The more 



